and sundry other letters passed. In one of these Van Blyenbergh throws in by way of postscript the sage question "whether we cannot avoid by the exercise of prudence that which otherwise would happen to us;" to which Spinoza could only say: "As to the question added to the end of your letter, since we might put a hundred like it in an hour and never settle one of them, and you hardly press for an answer yourself, I shall not answer it." Soon after this they met, and had a friendly conversation. Blyenbergh attempted to renew the correspondence, but this time Spinoza distinctly declined it.
We have also letters to various persons, chiefly on scientific topics, which approximately cover the next few years. Mr. Lewes has called attention to the interest shown by Spinoza in an experiment in alchemy to which he was at the time disposed to give credit.[1] And at the time there was nothing surprising or absurd in this; we have evidence, however, that some years later Spinoza had become more sceptical. For in 1675, when his friend Dr. Schaller had written to him from Paris, describing some similar process, Spinoza replied almost bluntly that he had no mind to repeat the experiment, and felt quite sure that no gold had been produced which was not there before.[2]
In 1670 was published the "Tractatus Theologico-Politicus," of which I give the title from an English translation (London, 1689): -
A Treatise partly theological and partly political, containing some few discourses to prove that the Liberty of Philosophizing (that is, making use of Natural Reason) may be allowed without any prejudice to Piety, or to the Peace of any Commonwealth; and that the Loss of Public Peace and Religion itself must necessarily follow, when such a Liberty of Reasoning is taken away.
The final thesis of the book is that "In a free commonwealth it should be lawful for every man to think what he will and speak what he thinks." And little more than two centuries ago, in the freest country in Europe, this opinion was put forth without the name of the author, and with the name of an imaginary printer at Hamburg, and had to be gradually led up to by an investigation of the principles of Scriptural interpretation and the true provinces of theology and philosophy. To modern eyes the introduction looks much bolder than the conclusion. I forbear to say more of the contents and character of the work, as Mr. Matthew Arnold has already given an admirable account of it in his essay on "Spinoza and the Bible."
The opposition which Spinoza doubtless expected was not long in showing itself. Early in 1671 Spinoza writes to a friend not named:—
When Professor N. N.[3] lately saw me, he told me, among other things, he had heard that my "Theologico-Political Treatise" was translated into Dutch, and that a person whose name he did not know was on the point of printing the translation. I therefore earnestly entreat you to inquire diligently into this matter, and stop the printing if it can be done. This request is not from me alone, but also from many of my friends and acquaintance, who would be sorry to see the book prohibited, as it certainly will be if it appears in Dutch.[4]
The book was, in fact, formally condemned some time after; it does not appear exactly when, but it must have been before 1673, in which year no less than three editions appeared at Amsterdam with entirely false titles, purporting to be works on medicine or history. It is hardly needful to say that it was also put on the Roman Index, and in that catalogue it may still be seen in a very mixed company.
In the same year a Doctor Lambert van Velthuysen sent to Spinoza through a common friend a long letter, which repeated in violent language all the current topics against the "Tractatus Theologico-Politicus," and finally charged the writer with covertly teaching atheism. This fashion of controversy survives to our own day, and has been improved upon. We have invented the term materialist, which makes a fine gradation possible. When we want to say in a short and decided form that we disagree with a man's philosophical opinions, we call him a materialist. If we wish to add to this that the disagreement rests on theological grounds also, we call him an atheist.
Spinoza, having a fancy for the exact use of words, did not like these controversial amenities, and replied (though it was unwillingly that he replied at all) more sharply than was usual with him; he obviously thought the criticism almost too perverse to have been made in good faith. But here too we may note his even temper and peaceable disposition. The letter ends thus: —
